Today’s Political Moment: The Origin Story, Simplified
Today, I focus on pulling big threads from decades of our history to make a rope. I hope we’ll tie that to a more hopeful view of the future in America.
Upfront
Being data-driven and providing an engaging narrative can sometimes be tricky for stories with numerous moving parts. This article illustrates a historical progression that began decades ago and culminates in our present moment, with an invitation to contribute your priorities.
Bottom Line First: You can probably guess that America’s current political polarization stems from forces of economic inequality, cultural backlash, and technological disruption that have been ongoing for at least four (or more) decades. Income inequality has grown since 1980, with the bottom 90% experiencing 36% wage growth compared to 162% for the wealthiest 1%. The income of the top 0.1% has increased annually by 301% (inflation-adjusted).
The Foundations: 1980s-2000s
Our current political moment didn’t emerge from nowhere. It was forged in economic upheavals that began before the Reagan era in the 1980s.
The 1990s became the Hall of Fame years for globalization, as labor unions watched themselves shrink due to work moving to lower-cost populations in areas around the world, where the U.S. dollar could purchase significantly more labor at lower prices.
Skyrocketing share prices and dividend increases became the norm, rather than the exception, among Wall Street investors who had previously experienced decades of smaller, more predictable growth.
The Reagan Era
Reagan and his ilk rolled in with a new brand of Conservatism, the “neoliberal.” With it, the government was pitched as “big is bad.” The first pillar of this policy emerged as the federal government driving less interference in the financial markets and reduced industry regulation.
Conservatives, seeking to connect with a base of people convinced that government was wasting their tax dollars, crafted memorable (and inaccurate) scenarios.
Horrible stereotypes were set into stories and repeated by prominent Republicans all over the country as facts: There was the “welfare queen,” an entirely mythical (and more illegal than typical, by far) fabrication depicting a woman living a great life off the benefits of the social welfare programs of the 1980s. On the other end of the spectrum was the mythical Republican “Western Cowboy,” a man of equal myth, fiercely independent, riding his horse, wanting nothing to do with Washington, D.C., paying outrageous taxes, or “big government.”
Of course, all of this was as fictional as a Hollywood Western. The Cowboy archetype worked in the Midwest and East as part fantasy, and part embodiment of the spirit of independence from government that “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” promised.
Did We Even Know What to Believe?
This all proved to be a type of air cover for more devious changes to the rules of the business game. The 1990s saw the rise of promised (but not delivered) “trickle-down economics” and the decline of pensions, driven by conservatives. In their place were new 401(k)s, stock-and-bond investment vehicles that powered retirements, promising a new wave of equity for Wall Street to utilize.
All the while, the economic data on manufacturing showed new technology was driving an old force in business: automation. Between 1993 and 2016, U.S. manufacturing output increased by 41%, primarily due to the introduction of automation, including robots and complex manufacturing systems.
Republicans, meanwhile, were setting the stage to launch a powerful, coordinated counter-attack on cultural forces marked as “progressive” or “liberal.”
Bigger than Economics and Surface Politics Alone
The cultural shifts in America were dramatic. The Republican Party, which lost the White House after Bush V1, had a new breed of strategists to create a long-term roadmap. A new conservative media empire emerged. This gave rise to the birth of Fox News, which offered 24/7 programming similar to CNN, but with a distinctly Conservative Republican angle.
Laws and policies changed behind the scenes to make this possible. The Fairness Doctrine, which the FCC abolished during the Reagan Administration, made it legal and acceptable to present one-sided content under the guise of “news.” The broader legal interpretation favored it as “entertainment positioned as news.”
Gen X: The Tectonic Divide Began
You might think I’d point to a singular moment that catapulted the majority of Americans into the early stages of the upheaval they are experiencing. I can’t; there isn’t just one. The closest thing I can come to is when we started commonly using the term “Generation X,” which was popularized by Canadian author Douglas Coupland in 1991.
This is important because, aside from all other disparagements, Gen X marked the onset of cultural liquefaction of norms that positioned them on the fault line equivalent to the “AD-to-BC changeover.” Before their time, the degree of uncertainty inherent in the future of growing up in America was portrayed in near-rock-like metaphors of solidity.
Gen X grew up hearing from their parents that the economy was always bad (usually), but lacked the experience and context of life in the 1950s, when the Baby Boomers had the consistency of postwar prosperity in America. Gen X found out most of the Boomer luck was oh-so temporary.
By the 2000s, when Millennials were emerging, the implications of a vastly more connected world were already playing out. Suddenly, America shrank to nearly the size of a computer monitor. Behind it was the size of the entire planet shrinking as the internet’s reach exponentially expanded.
The Origin of the Great Resentment
Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, investments in the tech-heavy NASDAQ index rose by 80%. It was 5 years of watching people get irrationally wealthy, more quickly than was previously thought possible (short of winning the lottery).
The crash was brutal, and many lost everything. The bubble burst from March 11, 2000, to October 9, 2002. Every generation witnessed a rush in optimism (“fools rush in”) followed by an epic “trough of disillusionment.”
Likewise, another bubble was brewing in the housing market. From 2000 to 2006, housing prices began to peak in various parts of the country, a trend that continued until the crisis started in 2007 and lasted until 2010.
Here’s where the nexus of the conservative narrative of small government, the religious beliefs of those challenged by global connection, and the financial inequality between Americans merged with a media machine ready to amplify all of it:
The 2008 Bailouts. Wall Street got rescued, while homeowners got foreclosures.
The Media Narrative: “Irresponsible borrowers” pit against “too big to fail” banks.
The Cultural Subtext: The connected, educated, and largely urban population got protection, while the conservative, rural people got lectures about “personal responsibility.”
The Obama Catalyst: He won during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
His Symbolism: A black president represented changing demographics that already felt threatening to white, southern (many) conservative voters.
His Style: He exemplified the “coastal elite” by talking down to suffering Americans.
He Made a Perfect Scapegoat: It was psychologically easier to blame a Black president than confront the complexity of economic and social forces in play.
Who’s Driving the Bus? The message was clear. White Americans had lost control of their country.
Economic MAGA: Boom and bust cycles were beyond their control.
Culturally, the mythology of simpler, older times played right into the mythology of conservatism.
Media-MAGA: Talk radio provided oversimplified explanations and targets to blame (immigrants, trade deals, and corrupt elites). Cable “news” was on 24/7, amplifying the Right’s core message.
Rise of Social Media: The home for echo chambers, incel man-clubs, and breeding grounds for multiplying grievances.
Trump’s Insight: As a reality TV star, he had the basic narrative ready by 2016. He had villains in immigrants, China, and “the deep state.” He was the strongman protector. And most importantly…
Permission to Express Resentment: All the pent-up racist rage suddenly found an outlet where it was not only tolerated, it was permitted, and even encouraged. Suddenly, the “wrongs” became “right.”
For brevity, I’ll skip the Biden years, which could easily fill ten articles. We have to get to the “so what, and what do we do next?”
The Polarizing Answer
All of the experiences—lived or heard through older generations still in the workforce—gave conservative Republicans a set of power dynamics they’d accumulated through years of dumb luck combined with careful planning. Suddenly, the combination of economic crashes, terrorism, and rapid cultural change through the internet and conservative media gave people a sense of learned helplessness. It’s the feeling that nothing you do matters, and forces beyond your control determine your fate.
MAGA offered a solution that liberals just made more compelling: agency through grievance. Instead of feeling powerless against global economic forces, you could feel powerful by blaming specific groups, returning to “older ways,” and supporting Trump, who offered simple solutions.
The racism wasn’t separate from the economic anxiety, either. It was how the economic anxiety got channeled and explained. When your 401(k) crashes twice in a decade and your house goes underwater, it’s psychologically easier to blame demographic change than to confront complex global capitalistic forces.
Do Liberal Views Fit Anywhere Now?
In this brief, and certainly incomplete, journey through recent history, I made sure to conclude the last section with a one-sided view of the world: the MAGA one. I did this for simple reasons. First, my readers are generally progressive people, and in many cases, I’ve seen a general lack of understanding, or oversimplification, of why MAGAs hold their mindset. I’m not out to prescribe a cure for this.
Instead, our progressive mindset – embodied by a view that the future will be better than the past, and that as a species, our evolutionary nature will drive us towards better solutions for groups who are currently underserved and underrepresented – also makes us tone-deaf and righteous towards those who disagree with us. That’s anathema to the very kind of thinking that led progressives to gain majorities after the Great Depression, in times when the Social Contract was established, and when Civil Rights gained genuine traction as the law of the land.
It's our responsibility to understand the two competing views of the world. One looks to the past, to the specific ways of acting and doing, the proven methods and laws. This is not morally or ideologically wrong, because as they say, “if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it.”
The other looks to the future, considering the responsibilities and burdens we’re passing down to the next generation, given the stratospheric national debt, and recognizes the need for solutions. It sees the gaps in care being created by gutting Medicaid for the poor. It takes offense at the propaganda being shoveled in our faces when we’re told that all these cuts make Medicaid better, knowing full well the people who are saying it would have to be delusional to believe themselves.
That’s liberalism, or some elements of progressive thought. What, in the vast areas of priorities, do you think I’ve missed? Please leave your opinion in the comments.
As Liberals, we’re (at best) disliked because we come across as elite know-it-alls. That’s not good for anyone, unless isolation is the point. This isn’t a blanket statement, of course. But to many MAGAs, their dislike, and their amplification of it through media, weaponizes them in ways that we are sorely deficient in defending.
That’s (Almost) a Wrap
The takeaway for today is this: There’s a view to our recent decades of history that connects the big dots together and lands on why we’re the way we are – divided, in culture wars, deeply entrenched, being led towards an authoritarian state (by textbook definition), and subject to mind-bending propaganda. But there’s an ongoing story that envisions what’s next for us. We don’t have to watch the needless suffering of ten million or more Americans losing their health insurance. We can offer an alternative future story, one that is more compelling, hopeful, and satisfying, leading to a more satisfying conclusion for our next chapter.
The Democrats do not have (and have not tried hard enough to come up with) an ending for the next chapter in the Democratic Republic’s vision.
It needs to be written now. It’s already overdue. I’m sure it starts with us easing off the culture wars on both sides, toning down the racist rhetoric, and making it once again “not permitted.” It stops making us feel nervous about masked men in ICE vests swarming a restaurant for immigrants, watching them get trucked away.
There’s hope. It’s just as much my job as yours to make that hope translate from emotion to proposals. Share your vision for what’s most important in the comments. I’d love to hear it. I want to follow up with a forward-looking perspective that brings together what I think we’ve realized is a common ground we must share if we expect to make Democracy work for at least the next two decades.
In the day ahead, I hope you’ll consider unplugging from your digital devices and getting some quiet time for a half hour or so. I know I find it helpful. I hope you will, too.
Be well.
Rick Herbst
July 1, 2025
Thank you. Words have power. When we speak divisively we contribute to the deafening disrespect. My mind’s ears and heart long for the tools of divine feminine power—described as “tend and mend”—aligned and working with divine masculine power. In these discussions we neglect the ways cultures and hierarchies have deformed and dishonored both sexes. Power over —power over people, the Earth, anything is by nature disrespectful and therefore destructive. Human’s are the only species who sees themselves as separate from the Earth—plants, animals, ecosystems, habitats. Humans use reason to justify greed. For example, they kill the elephants for their tusks, whales for their blubber. Once lush and thriving habitats such as rainforests and oceans are losing their lives and therefore the lives of their inhabitants—seen and unseen, known and unknown. The generosity of Mother Earth and Father Sky has been abused. What we need to proclaim is Health: physical, emotional, and spiritual; Peace: in our individual hearts and minds and our collective heart and mind. Respect: Earth and all lifeforms, seen and unseen, known and unknown. This path is Responsibility-response ability. Reactionary is neither Revolutionary nor Evolutionary. It’s time to put our feet on the ground, roll up our sleeves and be Midwives and Mothers and Relations welcoming our new life. Labor isn’t easy. Love isn’t easy. Yet we can’t survive without either.
The Midwest swing states bore the brunt of the globalization of reduction in American manufacturing. The demographics of those workers were young, male, and mostly white. They did not get re-trained and millions of these guys had their lives go to crap because of it. Purdue pharma was right there pushing an opiate solution. And it was party over.
Those families affected, and whole communities voted for a change, for job creation, a way out. they were angry and they listened to Fox News. And Rush Limbaugh. Game over in gerrymandered swing states.
Who controls the media controls the mindsets.
Right wing radio has a 30 to 1 listening audience advantage compared to left leaning radio stations.
The bird of prey has a left and a right wing.
But the falcon can no longer hear
the Falconer.